Conflict in Syria
The conflict in Syria pits two sides against each other. On the one hand, there is the group loyal to President Bashar al-Assad and on the other hand those who are against his rule. The conflict has forced about nine million people to run away from their homes. The democracy protests started in March 2011 after a number of teenagers were arrested and tortured for painting anti-regime graffiti. The protests demanded the president’s resignation and by July 2011, the situation had escalated.
In August 2013, hundreds of people were killed after rockets with the nerve agent sarin got fired at districts around Damascus. There are claims that this attack was carried out by the Syrian government. With United States military intervention, the President agreed to destroy all chemical weapons. However, there have been reports of use of lethal chemicals by the government such as chlorine and ammonia. The conflicts have resulted to more than 3 million people fleeing Syria, mostly women, and children. Most of them have fled to the neighboring countries, Lebanon and Turkey. Another 6 million people are believed to have become internally displaced as they were trying to flee their homes.
Mistakes Made During Negotiations
There have been negotiations to try resolve the conflict situation in Syria. One of the mistakes made is an agreement on who should be involved in the peace talks. According to Rodgers et al., (2014) in January 2014 there were talks that were referred to as Geneva II. The talks were not successful since the invitation for Iran to attend got revoked. Initially, the UN secretary General had invited Iran to the talks, but this resulted to Syria’s main opposition threatening to withdraw if Iran’s invitation did not get retracted.
The increasing support of President Assad’s government by Iran and Russia has also made the conflicts worse. According to an article by Rodgers et al., (2014) the support has made the rebels even more determined to protest against the current regime. The opposition has also gotten support from Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, United States and United Kingdom. The support by different governments has made the peace negotiation more difficult and happens to be one of the reasons a solution has not yet come to be.
Resolution Attempts
In an attempt to resolve the conflicts, in 2013 president Assad agreed to the complete destruction of the country’s chemical weapons arsenal. The mission got led by the United Nations and the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW). The destruction was after the United States military intervention. It was not completely successful since there are still claims that the Syrian government has continued to use toxic chemicals in their attacks.
These conflicts can get resolved by holding a peace conference where all the conflicting parties should be in attendance. According to Rubenstein (2014), the debates have been inconclusive so far because they have only focused on three issues. The issues discussed have been on who used chemical weapons, the consequences of intervention and the legal and moral norms. Conflict professionals are comparing this situation to that of Northern Ireland by mediator George Mitchell. The mediator got informed that he was wasting his time since too much blood had already shed, and the involved parties were so split that they would not participate in negotiations.
There were also attempts to refer Syria to the International Criminal Courts. According to a press release by the United Nations, the vote did not pass. The council could not agree ways to bring an end to the Syria war which has affected not only the Syrian people, but the entire region. The United States representative in the meeting explained that the resolution was about holding people accountable for the deadly crimes against humanity. Supporters of this attempts said that the Syrian people deserve international justice just like everyone else in the world.
The only process that can be used to resolve these conflicts is through peace negotiations. All involved parties in the conflict must come together in order to discuss ways to resolve their differences. All other governments should avoid supporting either side of the conflicting groups since this only results to more problems. If the foreign governments have to support either side, they can do so by ensuring the peace debates take place successfully.
Hardball Tactics
According to Lewicki, Barry, and Saunders (2010), hardball tactics in negotiations are designed to pressure negotiators to do that which they would not on their own. Sometimes, these tactics work, but if they backfire it may result to revenge since the negotiators find these tactics very offensive. Some of the hardball tactics that have gotten used in the Syrian peace negotiations have been an attempt to have Iran in the Geneva 2 peace talks. Iran is an essential party in these negotiations, but the attempt to bring them on board resulted to the Syria opposition threatening to quit the peace talks. These tactics backfired since the Geneva 2 talks did not go past the second round.
Involving a third party in the negotiations would be of benefit. However, the selection of what party to involve is very important. The selected party must be one that does not support any of the involved parties. In my opinion, for these negotiations to be successful, all conflicting parties must be willing to participate. They must also be willing to develop conflict ending solutions. The mediating party should be one that is respected by all parties. It is also important that all the conflicting groups get heard, and their concerns addressed without one looking superior to the other. I believe it is possible to end the war in Syria, all that is necessary is that the people involved be inclined to do so.
References
Lewicki, R., Barry, B., & Saunders, D. (2010). Essentials of Negotiation (3rd ed.). New York, NY: McGraw-Hill.
Rodgers, L., Gritten, D., Offer, J., & Asare, P. (2014, November 11). Syria: The Story of Conflict. BBC News Middle East. Retrieved from http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-26116868
Rubenstein, R. (2014). Syria and the Need for Peaceful Conflict Resolution. S-Car News, 7(4). Retrieved from http://scar.gmu.edu/sites/default/files/September%202013.pdf
UN Security Council. (2014, May 22). Referral of Syria to International Criminal Courts Fails as Negative Votes Prevent Security Council from Adopting Draft Resolution. United Nations. Retrieved from http://www.un.org/press/en/2014/sc11407.doc.htm
